Loose Ends
by The Geordie Lass
Summary: Ramza's never been good with girls, and it seems like all the women in his life are determined to prove that he'll never understand them. There's one in particular he'd like to understand, but once you've missed an opportunity, is it gone forever? Set between Chapters 2 & 3 of the game, this is a two-shot tying up the loose ends from Chapter 1 of the Camp-Fire Vignettes.
1. Chapter 1 - Hildy and Ophellia

This was going to be a one-shot, but once it crept up to over 10,000 words, I decided to split it into two.

Unlike Just Another Sellsword, this one can't really be read without having also read my 'Camp-Fire Vignettes'. As the title suggests, it's about tying up some loose ends – the generics from Chapter 1, in this case (though it does have Agrias, Mustadio, Lavian etc. in it too).

This takes place a few days before the opening of Chapter 3 of the game. Our team are having a few of days of R&amp;R in Dorter before heading off to Lesalia, where Ramza will be seeking out Zalbaag.

No real spoilers for the vignettes, as yet unseen, from Chapter 2 of the game (except Ladd and Lavian are a couple now – and if you didn't realise that I was practically jumping up and down and shouting out that _that_ was going to happen, you really weren't paying attention).

* * *

**Loose Ends – Hildy and Ophellia**

_Boar's Head, Dorter, Mid-Morning_

Ramza had assumed he'd be able to wear his old blue tunic for this visit - the tunic which had had the Beoulve colours sewn down the front. He'd unpicked those a year and a half before, and last night he'd begun to sew them back on – he'd need something of the sort to wear when he went to see Zalbaag, anyway. He'd made a complete dog's breakfast of the sewing, so he unpicked it again and decided to go and ask the ladies if one of them could help. As far as he knew, they were in the small public sitting room at the back of the inn. He found them there, the three of them the only occupants.

It was Agrias who put down her book and took the tunic, needle and thread from him. Seeing his surprised face she had asked.

"What? Just because I can't cook, means I have _no_ domestic skills?" They should probably lay off teasing her about her unique ability to burn anything except for water, he thought; she was getting increasingly touchy about it and a touchy Agrias was not good for anyone's peace of mind.

He sat down to wait for her to finish, idly picking up the book she had been reading and leafing through it. He'd read it before and so had she, probably; she devoured any book she got her hands on.

She got about a third of the way through the sewing, having surprised him with her speed and proficiency, when she suddenly held up the tunic in front of her, looking at it critically.

"Are you sure this will fit? It doesn't look nearly wide enough to me." She said glancing between it and Ramza's broad shoulders.

"Try it on, before I waste more of my time on this." She ordered.

"Here?" He said incredulously.

"I doubt you've anything we haven't seen before." Agrias said, then laid one hand over her heart and raised the other as if making a vow. "For myself, I solemnly promise that, however great the temptation, I won't jump on you in a lustful frenzy, just because you have a few manly hairs on your chest... assuming, that is, that you _do_ have any." She added drily. "Ladd's been going shirtless when he's training as a monk with you and we've somehow managed to restrain ourselves – well, apart from Lavian, occasionally, and she's allowed, after all."

Ramza sighed and began to unbuckle his breastplate. The tunic _had_ been quite confining across the shoulders, the one time he'd worn it since leaving Eagrose, he recalled. He gave Agrias a hard look before he pulled the padded jerkin he had been wearing underneath the armour, over his head. Lavian wolf-whistled, as his muscular chest emerged, while Alicia stayed quiet – perhaps the opposite of the reactions he might have expected, had he thought about it. He also wouldn't have expected the blush that had spread across the silent Alicia's clearly embarrassed face.

He almost snatched the tunic from Agrias and yanked it over his head. There was a ripping noise as he quickly pulled it down. Dismayed, he looked down at the way the arm had half-torn itself away from the left shoulder hole and the rip in the material over his right bicep. Ramza realised that, although it had been tailor-made for him, that that had been over two years ago, ready for him to enter the final year of the Military Akademy. At the time, he had been a skinny sixteen year old but he'd spent more than half the time, in between, fighting, so no wonder he'd bulked up!

He pulled it back off and held it up in front of him, looking with consternation and disgruntlement at the damage.

"Ramza, do put the pretty muscles away, or Alicia's face may actually combust." Agrias said, her tone, if possible, even more sarcastic than before. He gave her a fulminating look and caught sight of Alicia doing the same and then he quickly pulled his jerkin back on and picked up his breastplate.

"I didn't want to spend the money that we've made through running errands or off the monster bounties on fripperies."

"Putting clothes on your back isn't 'fripperies', Ramza. That's why you let the three of us have money for new dresses, remember? Besides, you'll need to be well-dressed when you go to see your brother, won't you? Or were you planning on wearing this torn-up tunic? Dorter's a trading hub and it's famous for its tailors; go down to Haagen Street and find one." Agrias said.

"Take Ladd with you." Lavian added. "He was still asleep when I got up but he should have be awake by now. I think he's probably only sulking in bed this morning because, when we got back from the job for the Bacchus Winery, last night, I said I was too exhausted to kiss his new scar better."

Ladd had said at supper that his only serious injury had been a single deep stab wound which had been Cured easily enough. In an aside to Ramza and Mustadio, he'd mentioned something along the lines of 'when I saw that knife coming for me, too fast to block, I was certain, for an instant, that I was about to be castrated! I don't know if that Lucavi scared me as much as the thought of that! It only missed by about an inch!' So Ramza flushed scarlet at the implications of what Lavian had just said.

He saw Lavian's lips twitch and wondered if she had just said it to make him blush. He began to speculate, darkly, about whether female Lionsguards were trained to be sadistic towards any man who was in charge – Alicia didn't seem to have succumbed yet, but it might just be a matter of time! Lavian and Agrias did seem to take great delight in making him uncomfortable – he knew it was just their unfortunate sense of humour, but it really did bother him, sometimes.

"His good clothes are starting to look decidedly disreputable too, and you said we had a decent amount of money in the coffers, for once. You need at least two new doublets, he needs at least one." She went on. Ramza tugged his forelock in mock-subservient compliance and left, wondering why, if he was the one supposed to be in charge, he usually felt like the women bullied him into doing whatever he was told to.

So, nothing loath to ultimately delay seeing Zalbaag again, he postponed his surprise visit to Hildegarde and went shopping instead, taking Ladd and Mustadio along with him – Mustadio had even less than Ramza did in the 'dressy' clothing line. The tailor said that, since the designs were simple, their new clothes would be ready for fitting and finishing first thing the following morning. That was a speed which amazed Ramza, who had grown up in Eagrose, a market town with only a single tailor, who would make you wait up to a fortnight for new clothes. In a town with a street full of them, he supposed they would have to give better service.

* * *

Around twenty-four hours after he had originally planned to, he stood on Hildegarde's front door-step waiting for the officious butler he had briefly become acquainted with about eight months before, to decide if, this time, he would be allowed to visit Hildegarde.

"Beoulve?" The tone was disbelieving. Ramza decided that since he had no patience for the butler's attitude that there was a simple way to deal with it - he would lay his heritage on thick, so he stared down his nose at the man and said:

"That's correct – Lord Ramza Beoulve, of the Eagrose Beoulves. Youngest son of Lord Barbaneth Beoulve, Earl of Eagrose, Viscount Garrington and Baron Beoulve and his second wife, Lady Merissa. Half-brother to Lord Dycedarg, current holder of those titles. Miss Merriton and I were at school together and I have actually stayed at this house before, hence I assume you are relatively new here."

This time the butler merely bowed respectfully and motioned for him to enter. Even hating his eldest brother, he had to admit that pretending to be as arrogant as Dycedarg was an efficient way of dealing with obnoxious servants.

He was shown into a small sitting room that he hadn't been in before, which was at the back of the house, overlooking the gardens. Hildegarde was sitting at a small desk and had turned in her seat when he was announced. She looked frozen in place as he entered the room. The butler bowed himself out and pulled the door to, after him. Ramza automatically went and pulled it back open a few inches, as was the accepted way to maintain some of the proprieties when a young woman and man were alone together.

"You really should speak to that butler of yours." Ramza said in a falsely hearty voice. "The man is unbelievably officious." He trailed off, feeling uncomfortable. "I'm so sorry Hildy." He said, his voice barely more than a whisper. She stood, walked stiffly over to him, then pulled him into a brief hug.

"You _idiot_!" She said as she let him go. "Why didn't you wait for a couple of minutes when you called a few months ago, rather than just leave a card? A _calling card_ after more than a year of wondering what the hell had happened to you! We ran out out of the house to try and catch you, that night, but you'd gone!"

"The officious butler said you weren't in." Ramza said, quite surprised that he'd been hugged and not hit. He'd been so convinced that that was about to happen that he'd cast Protect on himself as he knocked on the front door. He'd wanted his nose to remain unbroken!

"The 'officious butler' is already skating on very thin ice with me. Which reminds me..." She walked over and pulled a bell-cord that hung near her desk. "Ramza, what happened to you? You disappeared, fourteen months later you leave me a calling card one night, now another eight months on, you turn up, looking very... well... very different, and all you say is I'm sorry and waffle on about the butler!" She shook her head. A maid knocked and entered the room and Hildy ordered tea for both of them.

"I'm sorry, Hildy, I ruined everything. Juli dead and the rest of you expelled... your lives... You all had such plans..." There was a long pause, Ramza staring at the floor. He suddenly looked up. "Oh! Delita's alive, did you know?"

"What?" She looked completely nonplussed.

"I haven't really had much chance to speak to him, but he defected to the Southern Sky, sort-of, though I think his real masters are a corrupt element within the Church, and he's kidnapped Princess Ovelia twice in the last few months."

"Ramza?... I don't think you're well..." Hildegarde's voice turned very gentle. "Delita and Tietra _died_ at Fort Ziekden, so he... his _ghost_ hasn't been running around kidnapping princesses... Why don't you sit down?... Oh!... Is this?... Ramza, have you been _drinking_?" Her voice became sharper and she sniffed at him, presumably for the smell of alcohol. He gave a rueful head-shake.

"No Hildy, one thing you can always be _certain_ of, these days, is that I haven't had a drink!" She frowned at that, but her tone when she spoke was back to gentle and very careful.

"Then... I really _don't_ think you're well... not quite right." She repeated. He easily picked up on the fact that she meant 'not quite right in the head'.

As a tray of tea and various tasty-looking accompaniments arrived, he watched the concerned, almost fearful expression on her face. Ramza couldn't help but grin, though he immediately tried to turn that into a reassuring smile.

"It's not a ghost, or my imagination, it really _is_ Delita, alive and well. He says he was trapped, not too badly injured, in a space under the rubble and somehow worked out how to use Judgement Blade to smash the masonry. So, you see, he _was... is_ a Holy Knight, as it turned out.

"And he's only kidnapped one princess, it's just he's done it twice, the second time after we rescued her and took her to Lionel for safekeeping – only it wasn't very safe, what with the Cardinal turning out to be possessed... Now, do you want to hear the whole story, or would you rather continue to sit there for the next few minutes looking at me like you're pitying the poor delusional boy? I promise I'm as sane as you are, which may or may not be reassuring, of course!" His smile turned insolent for a moment.

Hildegarde gave him a perplexed look, but then sat down on the settle near her desk and folded her arms giving him a challenging look.

"Go on then, convince me you aren't a lunatic, because you keep sounding just like one!"

After about five minutes she interjected.

"A bouncer? _You?"_ He nodded. "And you were living in Dorter for _ten months_ and you never thought to just pop round for a quick visit and let us know you were _alive_? You could even have just sent a _note_!"

"I didn't know that you'd care if I was alive or not. I abandoned you, just like I abandoned Delita under that giant pile of rubble." His face became intensely troubled. She just shook her head and gestured for him to continue.

He went on talking but was interrupted again after only a minute or two by another incredulous interjection.

"A sell-sword? _You_?"

"Mmm-hmm. Are you going to listen or just keep saying that every time I tell you something?"

"Yes, I'm listening."

Three-quarters of an hour later she finally spoke again.

"You know you had almost convinced me of your sanity. But one of the _Lucavi? _You and only five others fought a _Lucavi_ and won. So, in reality, y_ou _are the ones who killed the Cardinal? I heard..." He cut her off.

"I've also heard what's being said. It isn't true – you _have_ to believe me! Look, why don't I collect you this evening and you can come for dinner at the inn and meet the others. Ask them for their version of things."

"Actually, I was going to ask you to join _us_ for dinner. Sam's due back sometime this afternoon.

"Sam? _Samantha_? Due _back_? She's staying here? I was hoping you knew about the others."

"Sam lives here now." Hildy said, looking uncomfortable.

"She does? How come?" Ramza was completely confused. Sam and Hildy had been good friends, but for Sam to be _living_ here? Hildy made that sound like a permanent arrangement, too.

"Did you hear any of the rumours that were put about at the Akademy about our rescue mission? You know after..."

Ramza blushed crimson.

"Yes, _those_ ones! The irony is that my mother might be happier if they were true. Covering up a less-than-chaste daughter would have been easier on her nerves, in some ways, than one who refuses to marry any man to give her lots of fat grandchildren. You knew I like girls?" Ramza looked nonplussed for a moment, then blushed again.

"As in, the way _I_ like girls?" He asked, for clarification.

"Honestly, I was never sure about _you_; you're so damned reserved all the time. If it hadn't been for the fact that he would flirt with anything in a skirt, and then him and Juli, I might have thought _both_ of you... I mean, you and Delita... being as close as you were... were, you know, together." Ramza opened his mouth, then shut it again, not sure exactly what to say to that. Hildy gave a short laugh. "From that horrified look on your face, at the mere suggestion of you and Delita, then _yes_, I like girls the way _you_ like girls."

"I didn't know... so you and Sam...? Oh!" So he had been _totally_ wrong about Sam liking him like that.

"Gods, no! Surely you weren't so oblivious that you didn't realise Sam had a crush on you, back then?" Ramza blushed.

"I thought, she might... but I was never sure. So, explain about Sam living here now."

"Yes. The reason I mentioned those rumours is that... you know how close Sam's family estates are to Gariland?" Ramza nodded, Sam's home was on the coast, only about ten or twelve miles south-east of that city.

"Well, so, when those rumours started at the Akademy, they didn't spread all that far. Just far enough, though, to reach Sam's parents' ears and the ears of all their friends and neighbours. We'd all been sent home, in disgrace, after being expelled from the Akademy, so..." Ramza winced visibly at that, and Hildegarde broke off her story. "You didn't force us, Ramza, we went with you willingly. Don't blame yourself for something you didn't do."

"I should never have even _asked_ you to come along."

"Maybe, maybe not, but it's all water under the bridge, now. None of us blamed _you_." Hildy said, and sounded like she meant it.

"Sam's father had already decided that the best thing to do with her was to marry her off quickly, even before he heard about the rumours, and so he'd been casting around all his acquaintances, looking for a potential husband for her.

"I gather no-one seemed likely to be interested, not once the gossip began, then an old friend of her _grandfather's _whose only son had fairly recently diedchildless, made an offer for her. She was still sixteen and he was about to turn _sixty,_ for the gods' sake! But you, of all people, with your background, know how this works; he had no heir and she was young and as likely as anyone to be able to provide him with one.

"She refused, but her parents insisted. So she packed up her things, dressed up in her old black mage's outfit and walked to Dorter. After all the marching we'd done, her home to Dorter's not so far, really, is it? She came here and asked me for a job. She thought her father might follow her here to try to take her away, but instead her family disowned her. So she lives here now.

"I was working for my Papa, back then, helping to run the security for our trading caravans. With the way that his business has expanded it was always the plan that I would do that eventually, but I was supposed to have a couple of years in the army, or perhaps the Lionsguards, first, to gain some experience.

"Papa's semi-retired now; he bought a small estate about eight miles out of Dorter - Mama's loving being the Lady of the Manor, as you can probably imagine - but he still oversees the important business here, though he has a manager for the day-to-day stuff. Jonathas, my brother, took over all of the out of town stuff; he's currently staying in Warjilis, since the branch-office there has been having some difficulties. And I run my own business out of this house too – caravan security for far more than just my father's business now." Ramza frowned, questioningly, he knew nothing about merchants, caravans or anything connected.

She explained that small traders, unlike her father, couldn't afford to employ full-time caravan guards, so they had been making do with what they could get on a temporary basis, to prevent their small wagon trains being raided too often, but with civil unrest and banditry in Ivalice on the increase, she offered a security service to all business running in and out of Dorter. The traders simply had to wait until there were enough wagons going or coming to the same place for a full-sized team of caravan guards to be warranted and then all of the wagons travelled together, under the protection of one of her well-trained, well-equipped squads. Her teams still operated as security for her family's caravans too, of course.

The idea seemed very logical, and typical of the no-nonsense Hildegarde, but Ramza was still impressed that she had come up and implemented the idea when, it seemed, no-one else had even thought of it.

"So Sam works for me, mostly here in Dorter, helping with the accounts and training new guards in the use of Chemist's items, but she's been out with an actual caravan, this last couple of weeks, and is due back today. She's going to be so excited to see you, Ramza, she was always so very fond of you." Ramza thought about it for a moment.

"All right, I'll come to dinner, but I wish you would come and meet the others. Five minutes with Lady Agrias and I don't think you'd doubt me. The woman's so blasted direct that she could convince anyone of anything."

"'Lady' Agrias? Just who have you been collecting in your little band of pseudo-mercenaries?"

"Oh, didn't I say? She's a Holy Knight and was the Captain of Princess Ovelia's Guard – that was before Delita kidnapped her, of course. We have the two other ex-Lionsguards, the Ladys Lavian and Alicia. After seeing and fighting what we have, they're determined, like me, to do whatever we can to stop this whole mess." He heard Hildy sigh.

"You know, if you'd told me that before, I'd have had a lot more faith in the idea the your story was true and that you weren't delusional."

"Oh..." Was all Ramza said, for a moment. "So you don't think I'm lying any more?" He added with a grin.

"I never thought you were a liar, Ramza. You're... _you_. Which means you're either telling the truth or you _think_ you are. I _am_ less inclined to think you're a lunatic now, though... or no more than you ever have been, at least!"

He pulled a face at her. It was so good to be chatting with Hildy again, and throwing the occasional insult back and forth. His face straightened and became somber.

"I'm sorry, I lost a lot of what was best about being friends with you four girls when I was trying to be the perfect Cadet Captain, didn't I? I think... I hope I'm much better at understanding that my friends are far more important than trivialities like that, this time around. They all insist I have to be in charge of the team, but I'd rather not, to be honest. So I only give the orders I have to and, if it's a choice, I always try to put friendship first, as long as I can do that safely.

"Well, we all have to grow up sometime. Understanding that people are far more important that a position or a rank is a big part of that, I suppose."

"When did you get so sensible?" Ramza asked.

"I'm a girl, we're always sensible." She gave him a smug smile.

"Oh, of course; it must be my stupid male brain that stopped me from realising that!" Ramza said sarcastically. He was quiet for a moment.

"So, Hildy, you're okay and Sam's okay?" He asked awkwardly. She nodded.

"What about Ophellia?" Hildy gave a deep, doleful sigh. For just a moment, he felt as if someone had punched him hard in the chest, and his breath caught in his throat. Something was wrong with Ophellia and it was all his fault.

"She's all right, Ramza, don't look so panicked! She's married and we just got a letter, a week ago, announcing her first pregnancy. She's _fine_."

"Did she _want_ to be married?" He asked quietly, twisting his hands together in a wringing motion.

"No, but it's not like it would have been for Sam. He _is_ older, but he's only in his thirties, not his _sixties_ and Ophellia says he's very good to her. She _isn't_ unhappy, Ramza, so you can stop blaming yourself for something which is far from being a tragedy."

"She may not be unhappy, but is she _glad_ to be married?"

"She wasn't, at first, but I can let you see her latest letter, if you want. She seems genuinely pleased and excited to be having a baby. Her husband's wealthy, titled and it sounds as if he'd do almost anything for her. Her life's pretty decent. As far as I know, she's fairly content with things, now... Are you happy all the time?" Ramza shook his head. "No, me neither. I don't think life gives that to anyone, but all four of us are okay, our lives aren't completely ruined - albeit yours sounds incredibly eventful and a bit strange - and you aren't really to blame for anything that went wrong."

Hildy was bending over her desk rummaging in the drawers pulling the occasional piece of paper out. She handed Ramza a fair-sized stack of letters.

"Here, I'll order a fresh pot of tea and you can sit there and judge for yourself if you think Ophellia's all right or not, while I get on with some work. I think that's all of her letters. You'll probably want to sort them into date order, though." He did that, and by the time she had poured him a new cup of tea, he was into the second letter.

… _my Father's starting to come around a little - at least, he's less stiff when he speaks to me..._

Her fourth letter was the first one that mentioned marriage. It was also the first one to be addressed to both Sam and Hildy.

… _so brave of you, Sam, but I haven't the same courage, I'm afraid. Father has apparently spoken to our neighbour, Lord Kenrick Fitzreeve, Viscount Covenham, about my marrying him, and although he's twice my age, and I really don't want to, father's keen on the idea and I don't think I have the guts to do what you did. Besides, I don't suppose your family are really prepared to house all of your friends who run away from arranged marriages, are they, Hildy?..._

Plans had become a lot firmer before even the next letter had been sent, a month later.

…_I tried to insist that I should at least be allowed to meet Lord Covenham before the betrothal went ahead, but to no avail. He and father signed the papers that make if official and it wasn't until a week later that there was a 'celebratory' dinner, where we were actually introduced. I wasn't really in much of a mood for celebrating, but now that I've met him, at least my worst fears weren't realised. He's not some bent-backed old man, nor is he ugly, fat, smelly or anything else that would be unpleasant, physically. He's not handsome or dashing, or anything I always dreamt of, but he has a gentle manner and a kind smile. Other than that, he's unremarkable – average height, build, pretty much average everything..._

The next one:

_...I'm really sorry, I had assumed you'd both be invited to the wedding, but Papa's still annoyed about the expulsion, it seems, so no friends from the Akademy..._

By the eighth letter Ophellia had been married:

… _It's strange really to think that I'm a married woman - for goodness sake, I still have days when I wish I was a little girl again. Ricky is everything I had thought him, kind, gentle and really nice. 'Nice' is the problem, I suppose, since 'nice' isn't really what I wanted in a husband. No, that's wrong. Of course I wanted my husband to be nice to me, but I suppose I just wanted something else as well. Something more exciting, I suppose. The wedding night was symbolic of the rest of the relationship. I'd heard it might be painful..._

Ramza laid the letter down in his lap, blushing.

"Hildy, I'm reading the first letter after Ophellia's married and she's just started to mention the wedding night, are you sure I should be reading this?"

Hildy finished what she was writing, and voice held a certain exasperation when she answered.

"Ramza, it's _Ophellia_, so you can't honestly believe she's changed so much that you're about to read a blow by blow account. She only talks about anything sexual in very general terms. If you can't bear it, I'll précis, I believe the word she uses for the wedding night is 'forgettable' and she calls the physical side of the marriage 'disappointing', more than once. That's about as graphic as she gets." She looked at Ramza and could see he still looked uncomfortable.

"Honestly! If you're going to be squeamish, like this, I'll just tell you the gist of it. Over the next few letters, while she doesn't say anything more explicit, it's pretty obvious she's frustrated because she was hoping for more from marriage, and she's honest about the fact that she doesn't really love Ricky, mostly because he's a bit boring, but she repeatedly says that he is kind and thoughtful in most ways, so she thinks that marriage could be a lot worse.

"So why don't you just skip on to the letter that came last week, where she told us about the baby. I don't think there's anything to offend your maidenly sensibilities, in that one." Ramza wondered vaguely what it was about him that seemed to bring out this attitude in all the women around him. Knowing he was a bit of a prude, they were determined to do what they could to embarrass him at every turn. Hildy was becoming nearly as bad as Lavian and Agrias.

He did skip to that one. Ophellia sounded pleased and excited about the baby, just as Hildy had said. Morning sickness was vile but Ricky was extremely happy about the baby and was being 'a real dear' - extra nice and kind, Ramza assumed - and she did sound pretty content. He allowed the letter to drop into his lap.

"There was a time when I assumed that if I were to get married, one day, it would be arranged – it's what my family do." He said in a faraway voice. "I really hope that if I had, she'd have been a bit less... lukewarm, than Ophellia about it."

"If it had been you, Ophellia, at least, would have been a lot more than lukewarm." Hildy said with a smirk. "Though as to whether she'd have still been describing your wedding night as 'forgettable', I have no clue, and I suspect from your reactions today, neither do you. I wasn't wrong about 'maidenly sensibilities' was I?"

"Shut up, Hildy! _Why_ do all the women I know take a sadistic pleasure in trying to make me squirm?" He asked, blushing.

"It's your fault for making yourself such an easy target." She said, grinning. He gave her a hard look.

"Come on, silly, don't look like that, I'm only teasing... Ramza, please don't be offended, but since you're coming back for dinner, I'm going to be really rude and ask you to leave for now. I have some clients arriving for a meeting in an hour, and since Sam won't be back for some time and I need to prepare for this meeting..." She let her voice trail off. He stood up and, making an exaggeratedly elaborate bow, excused himself. He and Hildy had been far too good friends, in the past, for him to take offence at her asking him to leave and return later when he'd already spent a couple of hours with her.

He smiled sunnily at the obnoxious butler, as he left, while he considered that being good friends with Hildy didn't seem to be something he should have been using the past tense about. Sam had always been the more forgiving of the two, so she would be even more likely to want to remain good friends. He was really looking forward to spending the evening with the two of them.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

I never really realised how crappy this site's spell-check is before - seriously, it seems to think that bicep, combust and sunnily aren't real words!

It seems popular, within the fandom, to portray Ramza as a skinny waif of a boy, which works, in my head, only for Chapter 1 of the game. At this point in the story, although Ramza's middlingly proficient in magick, across the board (I had him as one sort of mage or another for nearly the whole of Chapter 2, after all), he's has also spent a lot of time practising as a squire, knight, archer, monk etc. etc. so he will have muscles! Probably enough to do a miniature Hulk-shirt-rip like that.

OK, so I guess I've retconned Ramza's relationship with the girls, just a little. Well, I have and I haven't, since I tried to imply that we never saw their friendship at its best, because it suffered while they were part of his squad. I know I was never satisfied that I'd shown anything like enough friendship between him, them and Delita in the first series of vignettes to justify them being happy to throw away their futures and possibly their lives on the attempt to get Tietra back. If the relationship was only what I'd showed, they should have turned him down flat when he asked them to go against orders.


	2. Chapter 2 - Sam

**Loose Ends – Sam**

It never occurred to Ramza that casting Protect on himself when going back to Hildy's for dinner might be necessary. It turned out he was wrong.

"Ajora, Samantha!" He said, stunned, clutching at his jaw where she'd slapped him - slapped him so hard that his ears were ringing.

"Sorry," he apologised automatically for the blasphemy, "but... ow!" After Hildegarde's unexpectedly warm reception and sanguine attitude to the past, he really hadn't expected this.

"'I just need some time alone' does _not_ mean you walk away and don't ever come back!" She almost spat the words at him, eyes flashing with intense anger.

Sam was the quiet one, the peacemaker. She'd been someone Ramza had always enjoyed spending time with when he was in the mood for a little peace and quiet. She was supposed to be calm and restful company, as she'd never been anything else around him, so Ramza honestly had no idea how to deal with an infuriated Samantha. She spun on her heel and went over to the window, taking very audible deep breaths. He hoped to hell it was calming her down. He looked with mute appeal towards Hildy, but she was already approaching Sam. He watched them nervously.

"You told me you were over this." He heard her say, quietly.

"I thought I was." Sam muttered. She drew in the deepest breath yet, then turned back around.

"I'm sorry, Ramza, I shouldn't have done that." She said a little shakily, eyes brimming with tears. She stayed at the window, just looking mutely at him. Gods, but Sam had become even prettier in the last couple of years, Ramza found himself thinking, inconsequentially. He gave himself a mental shake.

"No, I'm the one who should be sorry, Sam. You have every right to hate me, I'll go." He turned and marched out, ignoring the "no" he heard from one of them.

He heard running feet and Hildy grabbed his arm before he was halfway down the entrance hall.

"Don't you _dare _walk away _again_, Ramza Beoulve!" Hildegarde hissed at him. That stopped Ramza. Stopped him dead.

"I'm sorry Hildy. I can't bare to see her upset like that and I don't want to make her hate me even more."

"For the gods sake, the last thing she's feeling towards you is _hate. _Go back in, dry her tears and don't leave her sick with worry that she won't hear from you for at least another two years! That's all that's wrong. I wasn't lying when I told you that none of us blamed you for that gods awful mess. Be a little careful, though, I haven't dared tell her you lived in Dorter for ten months and didn't contact us; she might do a lot more than slap you, if she knew!

"I'll go and find out when dinner will be ready, you go and speak to Sam."

He knocked on the sitting room door and tentatively opened it. When she saw it was him, Sam flew at him and he thought for a second that she was going to hit him again, but instead she flung her arms around him.

"You _idiot!_" She said, repeating Hildy's greeting of that morning with almost exactly the same inflection.

Girls were weird, plain and simple, Ramza thought, as he bemusedly raised his arms to hug her back. Mustadio always seemed to know plenty about girls, he'd try asking him if _he_ knew what the hell went on in their heads. Sometimes he was sure that their brains worked entirely differently to men's.

"Lets go and sit down, shall we?" He said, as he dropped his arms from around her.

"Hildy says you're probably a certifiable lunatic, these days, but since you don't seem dangerous I'm best just to treat you as if you weren't." Samantha said with a giggle as they seated themselves side by side on the settle. "I _think_ she was mostly joking." She added with a sly smile.

"Hildy's one to talk, I remember some of the things she used to come up with when we were at the Akademy!" He suddenly turned serious, taking her hands in his own.

"Sam, are you really okay? Hildy says you're fine, but you've had to leave all of your family and friends and family behind because of what happened at Zeikden." He said. "Because of the Beoulves." He added, his voice growing quiet and hesitant. Sam made a dismissive gesture at that last comment.

"I miss my family, of course I do, but they tried to force me to do something that I just couldn't have gone through with. Then when I took matters into my own hands to stop it, they cut me off entirely. It really bothered me at first, but now, I realise that if I'd done what they asked I wouldn't have seen them much anyway, and I'm an awful lot happier here than I could ever have been married to someone I couldn't stand."

"So you're happy? You like living here and working for Hildy?" He asked.

"Honestly?" She asked. Ramza nodded. "Living here is great, Hildy and I always got along well and that hasn't changed, and her family haven't been around much, but when they are they've been very kind. But... I don't particularly enjoy working the caravans. Still, that's not _so_ bad, since I mostly work here and don't go out with them too often. The other guards are mostly men and they can be uncouth and quite unpleasant to deal with, though. I'm young and I look vulnerable, so whether I'm being Chemist or mage, I've taken to carrying a knife for self-protection, and that's _not_ for the bandits. Still, once you hold a knife to a man's crotch as if you know what to do with it and threaten to cut his balls off, he'll usually back off pretty damned quick."

Ramza blinked, then his face became so shocked and horrified that, for a moment, she had an uncontrollable fit of the giggles. Her face sobered quickly, though, as she thought of something.

"For the god's sake, don't say anything to Hildy, though; I couldn't bear it if she thought I was being ungrateful. I'd be living on the streets, if it wasn't for her. My _entire_ family disowned me after I refused to marry."

"I still think you should let Hildy know." Ramza said stubbornly.

"Hildy says you took work as a sellsword, Ramza. It's not so different."

"It's different because _I_ was different, Sam. I've never gone around trying to molest innocent young women! I never would!"

"Of course you never would, you're _Ramza." _She said, as if that encapsulated the entire concept of treating women with proper respect. He was a little embarrassed, at the same time as feeling complimented. The embarrassment caused him to flail around for something else to say.

"Hildy's been a while." Was all he could come up with. He saw her roll her eyes.

"Hildy's being _tactful_, Ramza, giving us a little time. Gods! You always could be a bit dense about certain things." She half-muttered that last.

"Tactful?" He asked, confused. He wasn't going to to question what he was being dense about. Growing up around Alma, he had learned young that discretion could be the better part of valour, when it came to girls – half-mutters were best ignored.

"Tactful." She said firmly. She hooked and arm around his neck and drew him towards her. She gave him a kiss, full on the lips, and though it only lasted a couple of seconds, Ramza had time to think that, yes, girls were weird, but sometimes it was definitely a good sort of weird.

"Ah. Yes. I see. Tactful." He said, as he leant forward to kiss her again.

* * *

After a couple of minutes of kisses, Hildegarde had made a lot of 'tactful' clatter outside the cozy sitting room, so that Ramza and Samantha had time to be acceptably not-locked-together-at-the-lips when she re-entered the room. Ramza suspected that she had peeped in, before ducking back out and kicking something over.

"Dinner's almost ready, but I have to warn you that Grandma has decided to come down and chaperon us, since we're entertaining a young man." She rolled her eyes and explained that 'Grandma' was actually her great-grandmother, a tiny frail old lady who was only intermittently well enough to leave her room.

Sam rolled her eyes as well, then laid a hand on Ramza's arm.

"Don't get me wrong, Grandma's lovely, but she's a bit deaf and none of us will get a word in edgewise for the entire meal. The only time you might get to speak is because she'll want you to answer questions about yourself - though you'll have to repeat everything at least three times. That'll be just in case you're here to court Hildegarde, who she thinks should already be married... only, at the same time, she thinks no-one's actually good enough for Hildy. So it could be a rather _long_ meal."

"Of course we _could_ just put a stop to that by telling her you're here to court Sam." Hildy said pointedly, making both Ramza and Samantha blush.

* * *

Grandma had indeed been a trial, but Ramza hadn't really cared so much, he was still kind-of floating above the mundane aspects of the evening. He spent a fair proportion of the meal wondering how best to hint to Hildy that it would be nice if she could find a way to be 'tactful' again for a few minutes after dinner.

Hildy either picked up the vibes or had natural tact because she helped her great-grandmother upstairs to her room, herself, rather than getting one of the servants to do it. She dawdled, coming back downstairs, and cleared her throat noisily just outside the room the other two were in. If they had been kissing, and they probably had, since Sam still looked a bit flushed, it looked as if that had already stopped shortly before she got back – they were sitting comfortably, Ramza's arm around Sam's shoulder's, just talking.

"...your education, really? Oh, that _is_ good, Sam. You're going to try to get into the Magickal Akademy, like you wanted to?"

"No, and it won't be for a while. I'm really not interested in the wider range of magicks any more; I have no interest in learning more spells to kill or hurt people with. I want to heal and do that _exclusively_. It's going to take me half a dozen years, at least, but I'm saving up to go off to Ordallia. You know the Royal College of Physicians there is considered to be the best in the world. They're doing the most marvellous things; combining chemical salves and potions with white magick and surgery to be able to treat almost any illness or injury.

"I've been looking into it. I know if I study hard I should be able to pass the entrance examinations. But travelling to Ordallia, then sustaining myself while I learn, not to mention the tuition fees, I think I'll need somewhere between twenty-five and thirty thousand gil. It's going to take me an _awful _long time to save enough, but I'm determined to do it, I have nearly four thousand saved already. But the work Hildy gives me pays well, and I can usually put at least half my wages away in the bank."

"How long? Is the half-dozen years you said realistic?"

"Yes, I think so." Samantha said, looking just a little crestfallen.

"Don't look at me." Hildegarde said to Ramza, who was doing just that, a slight frown on his face. "I've offered to lend her the money – she just says I've already done enough. Successful, Ordallian-trained physicians can practically charge whatever they want; she could make the money back in no time once she qualifies, but she won't take it from me."

"But I don't want to just treat the wealthy, I want to be able to treat everyone. If I have enough money to get me right through, I can then set up practise anywhere I want, treating anyone I want."

Ramza looked thoughtful. Oddly, he excused himself, after only another half-hour of talk, a lot earlier than they had expected, saying that he needed to catch his other friends and speak to them that evening.

* * *

"Ramza, you've always said that, if any one of us need money, we can take our share out of the coffers. That's all you're doing now. A sixth will be just over four-thousand eight-hundred gil, by the way." Agrias said, sipping her glass of wine.

"Can I be nosy and ask what you need it for?" She added, almost as an afterthought.

"A friend." He said vaguely. "I'll tell you all about it soon."

Agrias raised an eyebrow then glanced at Mustadio, who was sitting next to Ramza. He shrugged back at her then looked at Alicia, who was looking equally mystified.

"Oh, and I invited Sam and Hildy to join us all for lunch here, tomorrow. Hildy can't come, she's got some sort of meeting to attend at the Guild, but Sam will be here. Will you all be around? I'd like my old friends not to think I'm a complete lunatic, and all this talk about Lucavi and Delita being alive and having formed a bad habit of kidnapping the princess has them thinking I'm delusional. At least if other people are telling the same story it might give me a _little_ credibility.

"Where's Lavian and Ladd, by the way?" He asked. "I wanted to check that they were okay about the money too."

"Early night - as in 'early night'." Mustadio said with emphasis. Ramza blushed, which made Agrias' face take on a sardonic cast. She kept quiet, though, much to Ramza's relief.

* * *

Ramza hadn't really known whether Sam had really doubted his sanity or not – did a girl kiss and cuddle with someone they genuinely thought might be a lunatic? However, lunch with his new friends seemed to settle any lingering questions she had had. The three ex-Lionsguards had dragged her off for a chat over a pot of tea in the sitting room that they had commandeered.

He hoped the women might be explaining, in more detail, the things that had happened in the last few months. He thought it more likely that they were trying to pump Sam for information about what he had been like when he was younger and exactly what the relationship between the two of them was now. Good luck with that! He thought. He had no clue, himself. He'd tried speaking to Mustadio about it last night, when they were getting ready for bed in the room they were sharing, but when he started to explain the situation, Mustadio had quickly interrupted him.

"It's very simple, Ramza, and I want you to always remember the next thing I'm about to say. You think _way_ too much! You end up paralysed with indecision if you do that, and for no good reason. If a girl wants you and you want her, that's a good thing – always, no exceptions... well, unless you're already married or something. It's when you want her and you haven't the first clue what the hell she wants, that you have _real_ problems! Now, seriously, I am not in the mood to hear about your supposed 'problems' because a girl you fancy is throwing herself at you!"

Ramza had no idea what _that_ was about, unless it was Agrias, though he still didn't think that Mustadio was entirely serious about her. He decided not to push it. Mustadio was never normally touchy like that, so something was clearly wrong and the tone of that last comment had suggested that he didn't want to talk about it any more than he wanted to listen.

Over lunch, Sam had seemed to get on fine with everyone except Alicia, for some reason, who was usually the most friendly of the ex-Lionsguards. Ramza tried not to let that bother him and, to be fair to Sam, he thought it was Alicia who had initiated the mutual standoffishness. It was a puzzle to him, but the chances that Sam and Liss would have much to do with each other in the future were slim, especially if he got his way, this afternoon. So it probably didn't matter, in the grand scheme of things.

After a little while, he'd gone to the little sitting room at the back of the inn, which, although they hadn't paid for it's exclusive use, seemed never to be used by anyone but themselves, anyway. As he had hoped, it was, indeed empty except for the four women. He tentatively told them that he needed to talk to Sam alone and, with speaking looks at one another, the other three made their excuses and left. He turned to her and took her hands in his.

"I want you to listen to me and I'd really appreciate it if you'd hear me out, fully, before you decide."

"All right." Sam looked at him, suspiciously. "I'm trying to work out if that sounds good or bad." She said, looking speculative.

"Good, I hope. You'll hear me out? Let me say my piece without interrupting?"

"Of course." She tugged a hand out of his and used it to push the hair that had fallen into his eyes back from his forehead. "You sound so serious. Should I be sitting down?"

"Maybe." Ramza pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, then led her over to the wing chair by the fire. He sat in it and tugged her down so that she was perched on its arm. To his surprise, she slid from the arm of the chair so that she was sitting in his lap.

"Go on then." She said with a sweet smile.

"Huh?" Having a warm, receptive, very attractive Samantha in his lap was more than a little distracting. Her curving lips were close and he could just lean forward... "Erm..." Yes, he needed to talk to her about... stuff... er... yeah - stuff... and things... and Sam was really, _really..._

"Ramza, the paper. I assume that that piece of paper has something to do with this." She prompted.

He cleared his throat, vaguely wishing he could clear his head so easily.

"Erm, yes... This is something I want you to have. You seemed very serious about wanting to go to Ordallia to study to heal people. You are, right? Er... serious about it, I mean." He said, vaguely worried that he still sounded like a fool with half a brain. He took a deep breath and tried not to think about soft lips in front of him, soft buttocks pressing into his thighs, in fact, lots of soft curves... He cleared his throat sharply.

"Sam, the piece of paper, it's a bill of exchange for twenty-thousand gil. It's _my_ money, no-one else's, it comes from the income from the properties that my father left me. However, you need to know that it isn't entirely 'untainted'. My brother, Dycedarg, his Agent deals with all of my finances until I come of age – I can't do anything to change that, he's still _officially_ my guardian.

"I won't... I can't bring myself to touch it, not when it comes, even indirectly, through Dycedarg's hands. And there's been times in the last few months when we really could have used money... but I just can't.

"Though I can't, I hope you can. If I sign it over to you, from what you said, that will be enough to cover the whole of your tuition in Ordallia for the next five or six years, with something left over.

"I have another five thousand in cash upstairs which I also hope you'll accept. Added to your four thousand, you could go off to Ordallia as soon as you like.

"You said it last night, and Hildy said it yesterday morning, that neither of you blame me for what happened to you after Ziekden. Well, _I_ blame me. I knew I wasn't being fair to any of you when I asked you to come along. My judgement was off, because I was so anxious, but I still knew it wasn't really right and I did it anyway." He closed his eyes.

"Juli's dead, I can't change that, however much I wish I could. Ophellia's married and she's having a child; so even if I wish she had been able to _choose_ whether or not that happened, it's too late now. Hildy's either one hell of an actress, or she's actually pretty happy with the way her life is going. Then there's you. There is no _way_ you should have to be carrying a knife constantly so that you can threaten to cut people's balls off in order to remain unmolested!

"All right, so I'm a bit hung up on that, but it's actually hard for me to picture my quiet Sam being able to do that at all. So, it's barely conceivable that you're being forced to do it on a semi-regular basis."

"Your 'quiet Sam' isn't the little mouse she was a couple of years ago, Ramza, and I'm happy with that. _Your _Sam?" She said a half-smile playing about her lips.

"Wishful thinking, and if you take that money, there's a chance we'll never see each other again, so no, not _mine _exactly, except for, hopefully, my very good friend_._"

She nodded, a faraway look on her face. Eventually, she spoke.

"Always that. But no. It's too much. Maybe... maybe, if it would make you feel better, the five thousand you mentioned; that would cut my saving up time down by at least a year. But not _twenty-five_, Ramza. That's far too much, you can't..."

"I can. Look at the date on this thing. I've had it since before the last term we were at Gariland started. It was originally my 'emergency money', though how or why Dycedarg allowed me to have access to twenty-thousand, when I was only a student, and only a couple of days from home, I don't know. Then again, this is barely more than pocket-change to him!

"Sam, if I haven't used it before now, I never will. This is money I will never touch, never use, it will go to waste, completely, if you don't take it. Please, take it... and you'd be doing me a big favour if you wait to cash it until you get to Ordallia. I don't want Dycedarg to be able to trace me, and if he finds out and thinks I headed to Ordallia, after I've seen Zalbaag in Lesalia, that will be perfect!" He leant forward and, giving in to temptation, pressed a brief kiss to her lips.

"Please." He said, and kissed her again, more lingeringly.

"How can I refuse a request, when it comes with kisses?" She said, when they came up for air.

"You'll do it, you'll take the money?"

"Yes, though I'd be more comfortable if you'd let me come with you for a few months and do what I could to help in whatever you're doing. At least then I'd feel as if I'd done something to earn it." He looked thoughtful for a moment, then shook his head.

"No, you said yesterday you've been sticking exclusively to chemistry and white magick." He said, not elaborating. She frowned at him.

"They're very useful support skills, I don't see why I couldn't be of help."

"We assume that there are more people with auracite out there, and hence that there are other potential Lucavi. If you aren't prepared to fight fire with fire, I don't think we can use you." At the word 'use' Sam stiffened perceptibly. "And I'd much rather think that you were doing something you loved and was making you happy than tagging along with us just because you feel a false sense of obligation. It's only money Sam, it's not as if it's something truly important."

"Only someone who grew up as rich as you would say money wasn't important, Ramza, but... all right, I can accept that you don't want me along."

"I really do want you, Sam. It's just..." He trailed off as he saw Sam's expression change from offended to something slightly incredulous and then into an amused smirk. He could feel the blush rise up his neck and into his face and he covered his eyes with one hand as she began to giggle.

"You really know how to sweet-talk a girl, don't you?" She said, the laughter not entirely gone from her voice.

"Don't. I already have enough women in my life who go out of their way to embarrass me at every turn!"

Still hiding his eyes, he felt her shift in his lap, her breath on his cheek told him that she had leant towards him. Her voice was only a little above a whisper, when it came.

"If it makes you feel any better, Ramza, I want you too." His hand dropped away from his face, eyes flying to hers. Her blush was nearly as bright as his had been, but she didn't look away, instead nodding slightly. Laying her hands against his chest and leaning in, she went on even more quietly:

"And you're right, after I go to Ordallia we may never see each other again. We..." she bit her lip, "if you'd like to, we could go up to your room and say a proper goodbye." She blushed even more deeply. The prospect intrigued, excited... and scared him, just a little. Then he remembered.

"We couldn't. I'm sharing with Mustadio, while we're here, and I don't know what his plans are for this afternoon. Besides, the money's a gift freely given, I don't expect anything in return, Sam - you don't have to do anything to _earn _it." After a moment, she stiffened again, then scrambled off his lap. Hands on hips, she said.

"Well thank-you very much for letting me know you don't expect me to prostitute myself!" He stared at her, open mouthed, for a couple of seconds, then she spun on her heel and headed towards the door.

"Sam, for the gods' sake." He jumped up and grabbed her by the wrist. "I didn't mean it like that. You must _know _I didn't mean it! You were the one who spoke of wanting to feel like you'd earned the money, earlier." She stopped trying to pull away and she gave a deep sigh, her face softening. He let go of her wrist and she raised the hand to cup his cheek, her expression oddly sad.

"I know. I know you'd never deliberately say something so insulting and hurtful. I need a few moments to think... Just let me..." He began to apologise, but she raised a hand to silence him. She went over to the window, and stood looking out over the stable-yard, her arms wrapped around herself, slightly hunched. Ramza just stood and watched her stupidly. Suddenly she spoke, though her posture didn't change and she didn't look around.

"I let you say your piece, uninterrupted, just like you asked, Ramza, so will you let me say mine, now?

"Of course." He said, feeling very worried about what was coming.

"I don't know what everyone's parents were thinking, sending us away to a mixed school, but expecting us to behave ourselves impeccably and then come home and marry whoever they chose. Delita and Juli were hardly the only ones who were sneaking whenever they could to find some privacy and sleep together, you know. Since there were less than half as many girls as boys, almost all of the girls had a boyfriend. I was one of the only ones who never did.

"Of course, I'd been daydreaming, since about the start of second year that _you'd_ ask me. Sometimes I thought you were interested and sometimes I was sure you weren't – I was never certain enough to even hint... Well, never mind. So I'd had this daydream about us for a long time. When I saw you again, I realised that the old daydream wasn't as dead as I had assumed and so..." She turned and looked at him pointedly and gave a rueful shrug.

"If the dream was what I really wanted, though, the thought of that money and the chance to go to Ordallia and begin my training immediately probably wouldn't be so tempting. Maybe... maybe I've been wrong and you and I would never have worked... or maybe two years ago it would, who knows? I think, though, maybe too much has happened and that chapter of our lives is over... and... and maybe the thought of a lovely 'what-might-have-been' is actually better than the memory of a disappointing 'what-was'.

"So I'm going to take your offer and go to Ordallia and train hard and one day become the best damned physician that Ivalice has ever seen, and though I'm still struggling to believe it, _you_ are going to save the world from the threat of Lucavi, it seems."

She came to him and pressed a very chaste kiss to his lips.

"At least I still have my very good friend... And this way, I'm not treading on anyone's toes, either." She added quietly.

Ramza frowned.

"What? Toes?"

"Oh, Ramza!" She giggled. "Some things really never will change, will they?"

She patted his cheek then took his hand and led him out of the room. Whatever she had just said, things had changed so rapidly that he really didn't feel like he knew what was happening or what, if anything, he should be saying. Sam seemed happy to take charge, though, so he let her.

"Come on, you said you had the rest of the money for me in your room. If we hurry, we can probably get it to my bank before it closes." There was quite a long pause. "... And Ramza..." her voice had become very soft, "the thought really is a _very_ lovely 'what-might-have-been'." She added, squeezing his hand.

* * *

**Author's Note**

So that's the loose ends of 'the girls' tied up! I'm posting this almost against my better judgement. I'm not completely happy with that ending, but I've been working on it for over a month, now, and I have run into a complete brick wall about what to do to make it better. All criticisms and suggestions will be very gratefully received.

Since I was never going to have Ramza paired with an OC, (Mary Sue? No thank-you!) then his relationship with Sam will just have to go down as a 'near miss', I guess, and be chalked up to experience. Sometimes too much water really has passed under the bridge. And frankly, by the end, I'll be juggling 14/17 characters (don't know if Boco (the floozy!), Construct 8 or Byblos count) so adding another, voluntarily, was never happening.


End file.
